Instructor Web Site

Sandi  Bacon

Sandra Bacon is a classically trained, versatile artist. She is known both for her paintings, works on paper and for her public artwork. She is versatile, working in a variety of mediums.

Recent gallery affiliations include: ARC, Womanmade, Peter Jones (all in Chicago) and recent public artwork includes: a mural in the Lake Bluff, IL train station, Cool Globes and Crystal Fight (Crystal City, Va.) Her small mini-globes have recently been displayed at: The United Nations, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and the Clinton Climate Initiative Convention.

She is a working artist for Golden Paints, and has her M.F.A. in painting from Maryland Institute Graduate School of Painting.

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Jill Berry

Jill is a mixed-media artist, teacher, and mom in the Rocky Mountains who makes story-telling structures. Her work involves social issues, maps, symbols, houses, housewives, and the mystique of charisma, and can be seen in Letter Arts Review, Somerset Studio, In Flight and Interactive Workshop: Mixed Media in Motion, and on jillberrydesign.com. Her handmade books are in the collections of the Newberry Library in Chicago and the Denver Public Library, and private collections nationally. She has taught at three universities and other institutions nationally and she feels that art is essential!

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Robert Dancik

Robert Dancik holds a Masters degree in sculpture and a BA in fine art and has been an artist/teacher for more than 30 years. He has taught people from kindergarten to graduate school while exhibiting his jewelry and sculpture in museums and galleries across the US and in Europe and Japan. He teaches workshops at art centers in the US and abroad including Penland, NC; Arrowmont, TN; Metalwerx, MA; Touchstone Center for Crafts, PA; Silvermine, Brookfield Craft Center, CT; and Mid Cornwall School of Jewelry (UK) to name a few. His work is in numerous collections including the Wustum Museum of Art, Boeringer- Ingleheim International, Schamberger International, Mitsubishi International, Japan, Gallery of Art and Design, North Carolina State University. He has artwork published in many books including “PMC Decade”,“Fine Art of the Tin Can”, “1000 Rings”, “The Art of Resin Jewelry,” and “Creative Metal Clay Jewelry”, and magazines including “Niche”, “Art Jewelry”, “Lapidary Journal” and “Perspectives”. Robert is the originator of Faux Bone™, a new,wonderful material for artists involved in jewelry, artist’s books, sculpture, and many other artistic disciplines. He lives in Oxford CT. where he is an avid cook (he didn’t say good) and collector of toys, maps, and compasses.

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Michael DeMeng

Michael deMeng is an assemblage artist from Missoula, MT who exhibits throughout the United States. As an educator, he has been actively involved with VSA Montana, providing art education and encouraging participation in the arts to people with disabilities. Through these activities, as well as his artwork, deMeng fosters community awareness, and offers creative methods to explore the human experience.

In his art, he addresses issues of transformation. Discarded materials find new and unexpected uses in his work; they are reassembled and conjoined with unlikely components, a form of rebirth from the ashes into new life and new meaning.

These assemblages are metaphors for the evolutions and revolutions of existence: from life to death to rebirth, from new to old to renewed, from construction to destruction to reconstruction. These forms are examinations of the world in perpetual flux, where meaning and function are ever-changing.

• Visit Michael's blog.

Instructor Web Site

Brian Dettmer

Brian Dettmer’s work has gained International acclaim through the Internet, bloggers, and traditional media. His bibliography includes Modern Painters magazine, The Village Voice, The New York Times, Harper’s, Time Out, Chicago Tribune, Toronto Star, The San Francisco Bay Guardian and National Public Radio, among several others.

He has had solo shows in New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Barcelona and has had projects exhibited in Mexico City, Berlin and London among others. Brian is currently represented by Kinz + Tillou Fine Art in New York, Packer Schopf in Chicago, MiTO Gallery in Barcelona, Toomey Tourell in San Francisco and Saltworks in Atlanta. His work has been in several museums, universities and art centers throughout the U.S. and Europe and his work can be found in several private and public collections throughout the U.S, Latin America, Europe and Asia.

Brian Dettmer is originally from Chicago. He currently lives and works in Atlanta, GA.

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Dean  Ebben

Dean Ebben received his BFA from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston, MA, where he studied sculpture and papermaking, and received his MFA with distinction from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY where he studied video and installation.

Ebben has been working as an artist in New York City for the last 12 years. He has worked with and collaborated with Alison Knowles one of the original founders of Fluxus. His work is in many public and private collections; he has exhibited his work internationally. Ebben has taught at: the Minnesota Center for Book Arts in Minneapolis, MN; Carriage House Paper in Brooklyn, NY; and the Museum of Biblical Art in Manhattan.

Ebben has been making cyanotypes and using alternative photo and printmaking techniques for well over a decade. He uses cyanotype as a way to record the “geist” of an object, and relies on the sun and the rotation of the earth to make his sun drawings. He is currently working on two cyanotype artist books titled Earth Days and Storm. He uses found objects and text to create a resist to light. The text in the book is the accumulation of three years of writing. He will bind this intimate quarto using a modified Japanese four-hole binding.

In 1999, Ebben collaborated with Amanda Degener (founder of Cave Paper) on an alternative photography portfolio for Hand Paper Magazine, Old Ways, New Views: Photographic Processes on Handmade Paper. The portfolio included seventeen juried artworks produced by twenty-five respected papermakers and photographers. In 2002 Ebben completed a public sculpture commission titled Waiting, for the Church of the Holy Family, The United Nations Parish in Manhattan. In 2007 he was awarded a video residence at the Outpost in Brooklyn, NY where he worked with professional editors and sound technicians on his videos.

Most recently Ebben was included in an exhibition, titled Altered Religious Texts at the Museum of Biblical Art, New York City, and is preparing for an exhibition at Susan Hensel Gallery in Minneapolis, MN.

Instructor Web Site

Daniel Essig

Daniel Essig got into bookbinding while studying photography at the University of South Illinois at Carbondale. One of his first books was an altered book, printed in Greek, with bindery that was completely self-taught. Rather than mounting his photography on gallery walls, he decided to place them in boxes or books so the viewer had to actively explore the art, rather than passively wandering past. At that time, he met Al Buck, who was making wooden-covered Coptic books. This binding was first used around the fourth century, in Ethiopia or North Africa, or perhaps this is just the area where the books were best preserved. Unlike most hand-bound books, Coptic books open completely flat. Images on the pages were wholly visible without struggling with the binding.

Dolph Smith helped push Daniel beyond the simple Ethiopian book, with his sculptural books that hung paper from wooden structures. Daniel's bridge books using the same Coptic binding with exaggerated elements were developed under that influence.

After completing his degree at Carbondale, his mentor Frances Lloyd Swedlund encouraged Daniel to attend the Penland School of Crafts, where he concentrated exclusively on Ethiopian Coptic books.

Instructor Web Site

Katie Kendrick

Katie Kendrick lives along the banks of the Tahuya River in western Washington, surrounded by the Tahuya State Forest. The peaceful beauty of the nature that surrounds her is a constant source of inspiration and nourishment for her creative spirit. She finds art making to be one of the most powerful ways to connect with her innermost essence while at the same time discovering her authentic voice. She enjoys the experimental and intuitive layers of creating, where she can explore inner and outer worlds simultaneously and she has a passion for sharing her love of creating with others. Katie teaches mixed media workshops nationwide and has been featured in several books and magazines.

• Visit Katie's blog.

Instructor Web Site

Stephanie Lee

A modern day expeditioner, I practice my own version of archeology, scanning the terrain for intriguing bits and pieces that present themselves. I am most inspired by nature and its melodic effects on the human spirit with my intention being to offer a simple and organic approach to viewers in my work. Passionate about repurposing everyday materials, I am committed to reinventing normal into something eclectic, expressive, lighthearted and potentially spiritually stimulating all at once.
Having traveled the United States and internationally to offer creative instruction, I find respite in my home studio in the valleys of Southern Oregon where I work from home - continually influenced by the view out my studio windows, witty comments from my young daughters, and the ebb and flow of creative energy. My own book featuring my found object jewelry titled "Semiprecious Salvage" is now available in book stores and her plaster working book co-authored by Judy Wise will be available mid 2011.

• Visit Stephanie's blog.

Instructor Web Site

Thomas Mann

A professional artist for over 40 years, Thomas Mann is best known for his “techno-romantic” jewelry which juxtaposes technological references, forms and construction techniques with romantic imagery. Originally from Pennsylvania, Thomas exhibited his work at Jazz Fest in 1977 and has called New Orleans home ever since.

Over the last few years, he has moved away from his signature techno-romantic design vocabulary toward jewelry designs that are, in some cases, models for large-scale sculpture. He continues to show his work at nationally juried craft and art festivals, in addition to overseeing a jewelry studio, sculpture studio and his retail space in New Orleans, Thomas Mann Gallery I/O. He has also expanded his role as a veteran professional artist to include a focus on education.  He now leads a series of hands-on jewelry making workshops as well as entrepreneurial thinking and tactics for artists in all mediums.

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Laurie  Mika

Laurie Mika is a mixed-media artist with a passion for combining and overlapping a variety of mediums creating an original style of mixed-media mosaics using handmade polymer clay tile. Laurie’s background in painting is evident in her mixed-media works influenced by medieval and Renaissance art. The gilded devotional panels of the past become secular icons imbued with personal narratives. Art and folk traditions referenced in her work derive from her travels and experiences of living abroad. The highly embellished surfaces, including segments of text, form sumptuous tapestries of traditional and modern materials. Like a modern-day alchemist tinkering with the ancient art of mosaics, Laurie finds magic in combining disparate elements. The current focus of Laurie’s work in polymer clay has been to explore altering the clay surface using a variety of pre-curing/baking techniques.

Laurie’s mixed-media mosaics have been included in many group shows and galleries. She was featured on both HGTV and DIY networks. Her work has also been published in numerous books and magazines. Her own book, Mixed Media Mosaics, was published by North Light Books in 2007. These days, Laurie spends a lot of time traveling both nationally and internationally sharing her passion for mixed-media mosaics.

Instructor Web Site

Carol Owen

Carol Owen has been a professional artist for 30 years, working in various media. For the last 12 years she has been working with collage and assemblage, making mixed media shrines. Her book, Crafting Personal Shrines, was published in 2004, and her work has appeared in numerous books and magazines.  Carol was an exhibitor at the 2007 Philadelphia Museum of Art craft show and has been a featured artist in Mary Englebreit's magazine Home Companion.

Her shrines use old photos and memorabilia to tell family stories. At first they were about her own family. Then she began to make up stories, using found photos and objects (the search for these items is half the fun!) She and her husband live in North Carolina, near Chapel Hill. They love to garden and travel, but her main passions are making art and teaching.

Instructor Web Site

Richard  Salley

Richard Salley has recently retired from teaching in public schools to devote more time to his art and teaching workshops around the country.  He considers himself not so much a jeweler but rather a ‘maker of stuff’.  Richard's interests include digital art, mixed media collage/assemblage, sculpture and jewelry.

He works with alternative materials and non-traditional techniques when creating art.  Richard has been featured in Step-by-Step Wire Jewelry and Jewelry Artist magazines, Susan Lenart-Kazmer’s book Making Connections, Collage, Assemblage and Altered Art by D. Maurer-Mathison, Exhibition 36 by Susan Tuttle and Contemporary Copper Jewelry by Sharilyn Miller.

Instructor Web Site

Mary Beth Shaw

Mary Beth Shaw worked in the insurance industry for 18 years before she went crazy one day and quit her job.   While exploring her creativity, she re-ignited a childhood love of art.  She is now ecstatic to support herself as a full time painter, living a “gypsy” life and participating in fine art fairs nationwide.  Her mixed media process utilizes pastel, ink, marker and acrylics layered with various collage materials; she welcomes so-called “mistakes” because they lead to wonderful opportunities and discoveries.  She works in series and has several bodies of work that employ her own symbolism of embedded meaning.  Living in St. Louis with her husband and 3 cats, Mary Beth is passionate about every moment of life.

• Visit Mary Beth's blog

Instructor Web Site

Susan Shie

Susan Shie (pronounced "shy") lives in Wooster, Ohio with her husband Jimmy Acord. Both have studios in their home and are fulltime artists. Shie, born in 1950, holds a Master of Fine Arts degree from Kent State University School of Art [1986] and a BA from The College of Wooster (1981, Phi Beta Kappa.) Both degrees are in Painting. Her work is quilted narrative paintings, which are time capsules of current events and her own diary musings, often created within the context of her Kitchen Tarot project. Shie has received two NEA Grants (1990-1 and 1994-5), four Ohio Arts Council Individual Artist Grants (most recent in 1998) and Artist in Residences in New York City, China, Ireland, and Alfred University. Shie received a $50,000 Major Artist Fellowship from The Ohio Arts Council and NEA in 1990-91. She won the "Best of Show" award in 1987, at the first of her ten Quilt National exhibitions. Most recently she was given the Teacher of the Year 2008 award by Professional Quilter Magazine. In her narrative art of diary, socio-political commentary and in her teaching, Shie strives to have a positive, uplifting effect on those who see her art around the world. Her work has been in many national and international exhibitions, as well as in numerous articles and books.

Along with founding and maintaining the GREEN QUILTS world project (which officially ended in 2004, after 15 years), Shie helps organize and develop local art events and projects. She sees the making of art as an integral and important aspect of healing: balancing, cleansing, and unstressing the mind. "When people learn to really bring their artmaking process from their intuition, unjudged by the rules they've learned, they make their most exciting work." Plus it's a lot of fun and fun is relaxing, and relaxation is healing. This is the emphasis in her class teaching: showing students the way back to creating from their hearts and souls.

Instructor Web Site

Jill  Shulse

Jill Shulse is a mixed-media/jewelry artist who loves to incorporate items from the past with items from the present.  Her love of antiques, coupled with her own family history and old photographs, is thematic throughout her work.   She was an 'Artist-on-Call' for Stampington & Company's Inspirations magazine for several years, and her work has also been featured in "Haute Handbags," "Altered Couture," "Legacy," "Belle Armoire," " Somerset Home,"  "Stamper's Sampler," "Belle Armoire Jewelry," as well as being a featured artist in "Somerset Workshop."   Her work was also in the books, "Interactive Art Workshop: Set Your Mixed-Media In Motion" by Kim Rae Nugent , and "Who's Your Dada? - Redefining the Doll Through Mixed Media" by Linda and Opie O'Brien.

• Visit Jill's blog

Instructor Web Site

Debbi Simon

“As a colorist, color, pattern and texture play an important role in my art and is prevalent throughout my work…whatever medium. Currently I have been focusing my energies in creating encaustic paintings.”

Debbi Simon has worked with a variety of art mediums and subject matter over the years. Working creatively since 1993, her paintings have been exhibited in juried and invitational shows and group and solo regional exhibitions throughout the Midwest. She has won numerous awards for her paintings. Her original paintings are counted among private collections. Doing many commissioned pieces that include Cityscapes, Children's portraits, Still life's, and Photographic portraits. She teaches many adult and children’s workshops in encaustic throughout the Midwest.

Her original jewelry designs have been featured in national and international magazines Bead&Button and BeadStyle Magazine and numerous Kalmbach Books. Her first book ,“Crystal Chic” was released December 2008. An Ambassador for CRYSTALLIZED - Swarovski Elements, she is currently teaching workshops and demos at the Bead&Button Show, Swarovski – Tucson Event and Bead Fest.

Debbi studied art and design at Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design (MIAD) and Wisconsin University of Milwaukee earning a BFA in Design with a minor in Illustration and Photography.

Instructor Web Site

Beryl Taylor

Beryl Taylor arrived in the USA in 2002 from England, having graduated in City and Guilds Creative Embroidery. Whilst in Britain she had spent many years exhibiting her work with a textile group called "Threadmill". She has taught many workshops in mixed media collage. Since arriving in the USA, Beryl has continued to teach workshops, has had her work published in many national and international magazines and has continued to exhibit her work both in the USA and throughout the world. In June 2006 she had her first book published with Quilting Arts Publications titled Mixed Media Explorations.

• Visit Beryl's blog.

Instructor Web Site

Karen Wallace

Karen is an artist, art therapist and art instructor. She leads creativity, archetypal and therapy workshops and has a private practice in Regina, SK. Canada. Karen teaches Art Therapy at several retreats and schools in Canada and internationally. She is currently studying Interrelationship Focusing with Ann Cornell and Wholebody Focusing with Glenn Fleish and has combined this with her knowledge of Somatic Experiencing and Expressive Therapy to offer creative and healing workshops.

Karen has presented workshops at Hollyhock B.C., Hawaii, Italy, throughout the U.S.A. and at several retreats in Canada. Her entertaining and insightful programs create an enriched creative process to play, explore and learn.

• Visit Karen's blog.

Instructor Web Site

Michelle Ward

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Stacey Webber

Stacey Lee Webber's artwork makes simplistic alterations in an obsessive, repetitive motion- sparking objects that speak of work ethic, time and beauty.  By focusing rhythmic actions on traditional jeweler’s techniques, her sculptures are bonded to the history of metals while existing as contemporary sculpture.

Currently, Stacey is Metals Lecturer at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. During 2009, she was recognized by the American Craft Council/Baltimore as an Emerging Artist and was a Resident at the Lillstreet Art Center in Chicago.  Stacey earned her Master of Fine Arts from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

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Jeanne Weymouth

Confident she was born under a lucky star, Jeanne injects optimism, whimsy and a dollop of gratitude into most of her creations. After her Norwegian mother gave her a tiny sewing machine at age seven, Jeanne has not let up in her pursuit of creativity and productivity. Though she managed to earn several college degrees, she has always returned to her first degree - Textiles and Design. It's the one that knitted up her passions for fiber, texture, color and imagination. Jeanne has taught numerous fiber classes including weaving, altered clothing, 3-d soft sculpture, free-form crochet and funky abstract purse creating. She is featured in various shops, shows, and galleries around Wisconsin and Illinois, and frequently gives talks and demonstrations about the artful delight of rescuing and redesigning yesterday's clothing.

Jeanne works happily in her sunny and messy studio in Central Wisconsin along the dreamy Wisconsin River and she takes frequent breaks for coffee, dog-walking/chasing, and meditating (aka "napping.") She relies on her good-natured husband for his humorous feedback and advice on her creations, and she knows for sure that the luckiest of all stars in her life is her son Alexander, 28, who makes his momma oh-so-proud.

Instructor Web Site

Judy  Wilkenfeld

Judy Wilkenfeld is a mixed media and book artist from Sydney Australia. Her mixed media art works, Visual Anthologies™ tell the story of a life or lives, past or present.

Presented in book form, wall art or in the form of an installation, she uses layering and the re-contexturalization of the materials to build the history of the subject matter. Judy’s use of symbolism is tantamount to her art pieces. Through the use of colour, textures, found objects and mixed media techniques, Judy conveys the stories behind the lives of those within the anthology. Bringing history to life in either wall art or book forms is part of her raison d’etre, “everyone has a story to tell”.

Judy has been featured in Art Making and Studio Spaces by Lynne Perrella, Who’s Your Dada by Linda and Opie Obrien, Exhibition 36: Mixed Media Demonstrations and Explorations by Susan Tuttle, Cloth Paper Scissors: Artist in Profile, Somerset Studio: Melange and Belle Amoire Jewelry. Judy's artwork has been also been published in the three leading paper arts magazines in Australia.

• Visit Judy's blog

Instructor Web Site

Nancee Wipperfurth

Nan has been making paper by hand since 1994 when she took a class and then did another semester of independent study with Walter Hamady at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. It was during that summer that Nan visited a friend’s farm in Belleville, Wisconsin and harvested corn stalks and husks right from the field. She brought the plants to the paper studio to make into paper. She learned a lot from that first experiment.

Nan later joined the Wisconsin Center for Book & Paper Arts, a non-profit hand papermaking studio in Madison. During the next thirteen years she made thousands of sheets of paper; served on the Board as President, Treasurer and Secretary; and wrote grants. She organized exhibits for Gallery Night in Madison, She continued her study of plant fiber papermaking and book arts. She has taught children and adults how to make paper, marble paper, bind books, create paper vessels and more. In 2008 the Center closed but Nan continues to make paper by hand and shares the experience with students of all ages.

In 2001 Nan co-founded Madison's Bone Folders' Guild, a group of book artists who exchange ideas, exhibit their book art, and encourage each other. She was instrumental in getting the group involved with the Wisconsin Book Festival. The group has exhibited their work as a Book Festival event since 2002.

Nan’s work has been exhibited in Madison, Milwaukee, and Chicago. She continues to make paper by hand at True Moon Studio in her home. She harvests plants all year long and in the summer she joyously makes plant fiber paper for future projects.

Instructor Web Site

Jane Wynn

Jane Wynn was born in Baltimore, Maryland on a cold day in December, 1969. She grew up making art as her focus and passion. As a graduate from the University of Maryland Baltimore County in 1995, with a Bachelors of Fine Art, she continued on with her education and received her Masters of Fine Art at Towson University in 1997 with a degree in Interrelated Media. In 2000 having just completed her degree, she began to teach art at Towson University and the Community Colleges of Baltimore County. Teaching has been a passion and in 2002 both she and Thomas began to venture off to teach at workshops all over the country. Since this time, she has traveled quite a bit and have met many wonderful students and fellow teachers along the way.

She and Thomas live in Baltimore, Maryland with their two cats, some fish, and a very sassy mint green scooter which they like to take for quick trips on weekends to the local coffee spots in town.

• Visit Jane's blog.